A Place Beyond Courage (39 page)
29
Hamstead, Berkshire, Autumn 1144
John and Sybilla moved from Ludgershall to Hamstead, and over the ensuing weeks, as the summer advanced into autumn, she was kept very busy about her new domain. She ripped down the moth-chewed hangings in the bedchamber, replacing them with good ones of heavy wool that would give privacy and keep out the cold. She had fresh plaster applied to the walls and employed an artist from Winchester to paint a frieze of green scrolls and delicate spring flowers. Beneath the frieze, she put up her own hangings, brought as part of her trousseau. A brightly painted marriage coffer went under the window. An ivory chess set that had been a marriage gift from a vassal was placed on a table under the light from a candle sconce, together with a merels board and dice. She had the floors scrubbed and swept. Everywhere was purged, scoured and renewed until she felt that it belonged to her and not Aline.
The servants grumbled at first. Under Aline’s regime, they had been accustomed to do as they wished and had neglected their duties. Sybilla discovered petty stealing in the kitchens and dismissed the culprits forthwith. She spoke sternly to the steward and made it clear that as a new brush, she was sweeping clean, and it was going to stay that way. The dairy horrified her. Aline, apparently, had never set foot in it since the day she became mistress and the place was almost a hovel. The senior dairy maid was decrepit and no longer up to the task, and her subordinates had not received the proper training, nor been inclined to do the work. Sybilla dismissed the elderly woman to a place by the hearth in the kitchen to watch the fire and undertake general stirring and simmering duties. Then she rolled up her sleeves, directed the other women, and set to work.
Yet she was no termagant, nor did she hold grudges. Yesterday was done and today was new. Once everyone realised that young and pretty did not equate to feather-headed and gullible and that the new mistress had a ready smile, an impish sense of humour, and was prepared to work as hard as she expected everyone else to, they settled to the yoke and began pulling together instead of baulking in the stall.
Despite being busy about her duties, Sybilla took the time to pay attention to her new husband. She quietly got to know his preferences and dislikes - when it was best to leave him alone and when he was likely to be receptive; when he wanted to talk and when he didn’t. She strove to please him, but not slavishly. She would have the respect that was her due and not be taken for granted and she would be mistress in her own domain. John had seemed amused by her air of propriety, but he had neither belittled nor patronised her. He had upheld her rule and let her deal with matters domestic as she saw fit.
On the morning after their wedding, he had presented her with a key to the strongbox. When she had looked at him askance, he had shrugged and smiled. ‘Now’s your chance to run away,’ he had said. Sensing the tension beneath his flippancy, she had taken the key and threaded it around her neck on the same cord as her cross.
‘Why should I do that, when I know where I’m well off!’ she had answered with a mischievous gleam. Her gaze on his, she had slowly tucked the cross and key down inside her gown, the obvious inference being that they would lie between her breasts.
Patrick, entering the chamber looking rather the worse for wear after a long night’s carousing, had stared at the pair of them with bleary eyes. John’s smile had become a conspiratorial laugh. ‘Strangely enough, I believe you!’ he had said.
The marriage bed was a joy to Sybilla for John aroused a hunger within her that had been so long suppressed it was ravenous. She would watch his hands at practical tasks - reining his horse, wielding his sword, holding his knife to cut food - and would think of their tactile eloquence on her body. She would stare at his wonderful hard mouth that could be as subtle as silk, think of the knowing point of his tongue, and shiver with lust. She was also learning what he liked in the bedchamber and suspected that poor Aline must have been completely out of her depth when faced with such sensual intensity. His appetite was carnal but so was Sybilla’s and she found it pure pleasure to dine.
If the memory of Aline’s presence was no more than a wispy ghost that Sybilla sought determinedly to expunge from hall and bower as efficiently as she removed the strands of cobwebs from corner and rafter, then the sons of that first marriage were a different matter. Her heart had gone out to them - lost little boys of ten and six, as wary as two starving stray dogs cowering near the kitchen door and hoping for scraps. She could sense their frightened hostility at having to accept their father’s new wife as their stepmother and was not surprised. Having witnessed their mother being bundled off into the custody of the Church and being told that she and their father had never been married in the eyes of that Church was bound to have repercussions. Their stability had been shattered.
John, she saw, was uneasy around his sons, and obviously felt guilty about the effect the annulment had had upon them. However, he was determined to do the best he could for them and was looking to engage tutors and bring their education up to scratch. ‘I have neglected their instruction for far too long,’ he had confided in her. ‘I should never have left them in their mother’s keeping, knowing what she was like. I can only hope there’s still time to rectify the damage.’
A great deal had gone unsaid and Sybilla had chosen not to probe, sensing that she wouldn’t get very far. She had noticed how his horses, his men, his equipment were of the best and how he demanded the full effort from everyone - as he demanded it of himself. His sons were an extension of him - the future - and she suspected he was troubled at their lack of spark.
In between all the bustle of cleaning and sprucing at Hamstead, Sybilla brought the boys into the bower to sort out some fabric to make them new tunics. The cloth had come with her from Salisbury with her trousseau. She had quietly raided one of the livery cupboards before she left, reasoning that the end bolts of green and rust-red twill had been there long enough and she had more need of them than Patrick did.
Her women spread the fabrics across a trestle and she set about measuring her stepsons. Gilbert eyed her warily from under his fringe and the younger one kept thinking about sucking his thumb, then remembering he wasn’t supposed to.
‘I hope you will learn to trust me and know you can come to me if you need anything,’ Sybilla said as she worked, making knots in the cord to mark arm length and neck-to-hem dimensions. ‘I may not be your mother, but your father is now my husband and you are his boys; therefore you are my boys too, and I will care for you as best I can.’ Finished, she handed the cords to Gundred, then beckoned Gilbert and Walter to follow her to the marriage coffer. ‘I have something for you.’ She produced a couple of leather slings and some smooth polished white stones with which to practise.
‘I have no doubt your father can use one because he knows every weapon skill back to front, but I warrant I could still show him a trick or two . . . and so could you if you train.’
Gilbert’s eyes widened. ‘You can use a slingshot?’
She smiled. ‘Why shouldn’t I? When I was a little girl it was my task to keep the birds off the tender plants in my mother’s garden with one of these and I always had it with me when I walked the dogs.’ The smile became a laugh at their faces, which could not have worn more astonishment had she suddenly grown two heads. ‘I can use a bow too; I’m quite good at archery.’
The boys exchanged glances. ‘What about a sword?’ Gilbert challenged.
She shook her head. ‘Oh, not one of them. I leave that to you men.’ She spoke in a tone designed to salve and flatter their masculine pride. ‘Go and practise now in the ward while I see to the cutting of your tunics. I’ll join you in a while.’
Heads together, whispering, they left the room. Still smiling, but with pensive eyes, Sybilla turned to her task. Moments later John arrived, munching on an apple he had purloined from one of the orchard baskets in the ward. ‘Eating out of your hands,’ he said with a glance back over his shoulder towards the stairway.
She pursed her lips. ‘Not quite, but getting there . . . although in a moment I am going to have to prove that I can use a slingshot.’
‘And can you?’ His good eye gleamed.
She nodded. ‘My father taught me when I was little. I used to be good, but I haven’t practised in a while.’ She stuck her tongue in the side of her cheek. ‘Of course trebuchets are much more interesting.’
John started to grin. ‘Trebuchets?’
‘I was older then of course. We didn’t have much recourse to those sorts of weapons when old King Henry was alive - although perhaps you did.’
‘Not that much, but I’ve had plenty of experience since,’ he said drily. ‘It’s useful to know my wife can man one though, should it ever come to a siege.’
She made a small sound of amusement and turned back to the sewing trestle.
‘There’s news arrived from court,’ he said after a moment.
Sybilla inserted a pin into the cloth and faced him again.
‘The Norman lords have bowed to the Empress’s husband and offered him Normandy. Whatever Stephen does he cannot get it back; it’s too great an undertaking.’
He was watching her with that same cautious look she had just seen in his eldest son’s gaze. Sybilla felt as if she was being tested and that her reply was somehow important. ‘So Stephen won’t be able to call on Normandy for resources,’ she said, ‘but he’ll be able to put what he has into holding England. Should we brace ourselves for assaults on our castles?’
She must have said the right thing, because his tension eased. ‘I think we should, although they’re all primed anyway. Stephen will constantly be looking to the coast for the threat of an invasion.’
‘So my trebuchet skills may be invaluable.’
He gave a soft laugh. ‘Ah Sybilla, you are priceless.’
She narrowed her eyes.
He sobered. ‘Oh, I mean it. You are beyond rubies, believe me.’
Comprehension dawned. He had been waiting to see if she showed interest or understanding and had been preparing for her to look at him with the vapid stare of a sheep, or start twittering with fear. ‘I do believe you,’ she said with a mischievous smile. ‘So you might as well tell me the rest.’
‘How do you know there is more?’
‘I’m guessing ahead with loaded dice.’
He looked both amused and wry. ‘Then you have two sixes. I’ve to go to court. Things change quickly. Even with word from my deputies, I have to see for myself from time to time.’
She nodded briskly and again saw him react with relief. Aline, she remembered, had always feared his absences. Sybilla didn’t particularly desire to see him gone, but she wasn’t afraid. She was accustomed to running a household and could find plenty to keep her occupied while she waited for his return. With that in mind, she asked his leave to visit Salisbury.
‘Are you pining for your brother already? Is life here so bad?’ His tone held a sudden sharp undercurrent.
She made a face at him. ‘It would serve you right if I said yes to both, but the truth is I need more needles and thread. All this sewing is eating up supplies. There’s almost no linen either.’ She didn’t add that the fabric she had brought with her was almost all gone and that there had been virtually nothing in store, with what there was being of poor quality. She would not denigrate Aline aloud, no matter her private thoughts on the matter.
‘I will begin to think you profligate,’ he said with a straight face.
She made an indifferent gesture. ‘It is up to you if you desire yourself and your retainers to walk around in rags. Once the initial sewing has been done, there will be less outlay. I know the men have to be paid first and your castles kept in good repair.’ She came to him, removed the apple from his hands and took a juicy bite from the other side. ‘My lord,’ she added pertly.
John pulled her against him. Ignoring the presence of her women, he nuzzled her throat. ‘If I didn’t have matters to attend to . . .’
She swallowed, laughed and set her arms around his neck. ‘You would do what?’
‘Put you on that table and swive you until you screamed,’ he growled against her earlobe.
Sybilla rubbed playfully against him, fully aware of the effect she was having on him, before pulling reluctantly away. ‘Entertaining,’ she said, ‘especially if your sons should return - and my women would never be able to look me in the face again or cut cloth on that table without smirking . . . although if you wish to render your debt then it is my duty to comply.’ She gave him a coquettish look through her lashes as she handed the apple back to him. She was as aroused as he was, but knew it would go no further than teasing. They both had duties more pressing, if less pleasurable. ‘Besides, I’m expecting a visit from my chaplain, and it would make confession interesting, don’t you think? It is one thing to confess to the sins of lust and fornication, quite another for your priest to have witnessed you indulging in those sins.’
‘It’s not a sin if one is intent on procreation.’
Sybilla smiled and put her hand to her flat belly. ‘What if the intent has already been fulfilled?’
His gaze quickened. ‘Are you telling me that you are with child?’
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